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    Previously unseen memo details Trump plot to subvert election results – report

    A previously unseen internal memo from the 2020 Trump campaign describes in detail the plot by Donald Trump and his lawyers to subvert election results in six states, according to a copy obtained by The New York Times.The memo describes a three-pronged plan to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory on 6 January 2020, that involved coordinating with Republican electors and campaign attorneys in six states, as well as Mike Pence.It also emphasized the importance of the participation by “all six states” and “messaging about this being a routine measure” as well as “logistics” regarding what is now known as the fake electors scheme.The letter was written by Kenneth Chesebro, an attorney associated with Trump who is believed to be one of six unnamed co-conspirators in the indictment against Trump over his attempt to subvert the results of the 2020 election. Much of Chesebro’s actions have been revealed through previous memos and through the January 6 investigation last year, but this memo brings further details to light about the fake electors scheme that he concocted.It was addressed to a Wisconsin lawyer, James R Troupis, the lead attorney for the Trump campaign in Wisconsin, who oversaw the fake electors scheme in his state. Troupis filed a lawsuit in December 2020 asking the Wisconsin supreme court to throw out hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots, saying they violated voting requirements. The court ultimately rejected the lawsuit.Chesebro wrote to Troupis that “it seems feasible” the Trump campaign could subvert Biden’s victory. His plan would “force the Members of Congress, the media, and the American people to focus on the substantive evidence of illegal election and counting activities in the six contested States, provided three things happen”.He then lays out those three steps, describing a plan in detail.According to Chesebro’s plan, Republican electors in all six states – Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin – would meet and cast votes for Trump on 14 December 2020, the deadline for electors to send their votes to Congress for certification in January.Attorneys in each of the six states would simultaneously file lawsuits that would lead to either a Trump victory or a Biden loss – which would be pending on 6 January, the certification date.Finally, on the day Congress meets to certify the electors’ votes, “Pence, presiding over the joint session, takes the position that it is his constitutional power and duty, alone, as president of the Senate, to both open and count the votes, and that anything in the Electoral Count Act to the contrary is unconstitutional,” according to language from the memo.Pence, who is running against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024, has lashed out against his former ticket-mate and his “gaggle of crackpot lawyers” for plotting to overturn the election.According to the indictment, Trump repeatedly “pressured” Pence to participate in the plan, to which the vice-president replied: “You know I don’t think I have the authority to change the outcome”.The indictment identified six co-conspirators, including one who is widely believed to be Chesebro. Co-Conspirator 5, thought to be Chesebro, “assisted in devising and attempting to implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding”.The indictment also described the previously unseen 6 December 2020 memo as a “sharp departure” from an earlier and previously reported memo that Chesebro sent to Troupis outlining a plan to use “alternate” electors to send votes for Trump to Congress for certification amid a recount – even though Biden won the state.“I recognize that what I suggest is a bold, controversial strategy, and that there are many reasons why it might not end up being executed on January 6,” Chesebro wrote in the 6 December 2020 memo. “But as long as it is one possible option, to preserve it as a possibility it is important that the Trump-Pence electors cast their electoral votes on December 14.”Trump pleaded not guilty on all counts in the 6 January case, which charged him with three counts of conspiracy and one count of obstruction of an official proceeding – certifying the electoral vote. More

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    Secret Trump memo outlined plot to overturn 2020 election; protection order hearing set for Friday – live

    From 3h agoGood morning, US politics blog readers. A lawyer allied with former president Donald Trump initially pitched the now-infamous plan to use fake electors in swing states to subvert the 2020 election results as “a bold, controversial strategy” that the supreme court would “likely” reject, according to a secret memo.Federal prosecutors are portraying the memo, dated 6 December 2020 and written by Kenneth Chesebro, as a crucial link in how the Trump team’s efforts to keep him in power evolved into a criminal conspiracy, according to a New York Times report. The existence of the memo came to light in last week’s indictment of Trump.Chesebro, identified as “co-conspirator 5” in the federal indictment of Trump, reportedly argued that the plan would focus attention on claims of voter fraud and “buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column”. He wrote in the memo:
    I recognize that what I suggest is a bold, controversial strategy, and that there are many reasons why it might not end up being executed on Jan. 6. But as long as it is one possible option, to preserve it as a possibility it is important that the Trump-Pence electors cast their electoral votes on Dec. 14.
    The document, described by prosecutors as the “fraudulent elector memo”, provides new details about how the plan originated and was discussed behind the scenes. The memo show the plan was a criminal plot to engineer “a fake controversy that would derail the proper certification of Biden as president-elect”, prosecutors said.Here’s what else we’re watching today:
    3pm EST: President Joe Biden will speak about his administration’s clean energy and manufacturing investments in Albuquerque.
    5.55pm EST: Biden will fly to Salt Lake city.
    The House and Senate are out.
    An internal Trump campaign memo by Kenneth Chesebro, a lawyer allied with Donald Trump, reveals new details about how the former president and his team initiated the plan to interfere with the electoral college process and install fake GOP electors in multiple states after losing the 2020 presidential election.The 6 December 2020 memo, made public on Tuesday by the New York Times, shows how Chesebro laid out the plan to put forth slates of Republican electors in seven key swing states that Trump had lost.The document, which federal prosecutors described as a “fraudulent elector memo”, revealed that Chesebro proposed the appointment of fake electors, and detailed a “messaging” strategy to portray them as evidence if legislatures later concluded Trump as the victor in those states.In the memo, Chesebro acknowledges that he is suggesting a “bold, controversial strategy” that the supreme court would “likely” ultimately reject. He argues that the plan would focus attention on claims of voter fraud and “buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column”.The memo was referenced in the four-count indictment against Trump by a Washington DC grand jury last month. The indictment identifies, but does not name, Chesebro as a co-conspirator in Trump’s alleged conspiracy to obstruct certification of the 2020 election.In separate, previously seen emails, Chesebro had also suggested having then-vice president Mike Pence open and count the electoral votes alone. Pence would then certify the fake electors’ votes, even though Biden would have won the state, according to the plan.There has been open debate within the Democratic party over whether Senator Dianne Feinstein, 90, whose health and cognitive abilities have come into question after a two-and-a-half-month absence due to shingles and other medical complications, should resign.Questions over Feinstein’s ability to effectively represent California, the most populous US state, have been a sensitive issue for Democrats going back years. As her diminishing health plays out in the public eye there is a renewed urgency to the situation. Riding out her term in absentia until retirement next year is also not a viable option, with Feinstein the tie-breaking vote on the Senate judiciary committee, which holds confirmation hearings for judicial nominees, and effectively the only person who can ensure that Joe Biden’s picks for judges go through.Feinstein’s compounding health issues and status as the oldest member of Congress now present Democrats with a complex problem that has pitted several prominent members of Congress against each other, as several lawmakers issued calls in recent weeks for Feinstein to step down.California Democrats, who voted her into office six times, are increasingly divided over whether she should continue to serve. More than 60 progressive organizations called on her to step down – noting that the 39 million constituents she represents deserve “constant representation”. It hasn’t helped that the senator has physically shielded herself from her constituents and the press, dismissing questions about her health and ability to serve.Feinstein’s eventual return to Washington on 10 May only prompted a new round of debate and news coverage, after she arrived looking exceedingly frail and appeared confused by reporters’ questions about her absence. Feinstein suffered more complications from her illness than previously disclosed, the New York Times reported, including post-shingles encephalitis and a condition known as Ramsay Hunt syndrome which causes facial paralysis.Read the full story here.California senator Dianne Feinstein’s latest medical setback comes days after she reportedly handed power of attorney over to her daughter.Katherine, a former San Francisco judge, is said to have been given power of attorney over her mother amid an ongoing dispute regarding her late husband Richard Blum’s estate, according to the New York Times.Senator Dianne Feinstein was hospitalized after tripping and falling in her San Francisco home, according to multiple reports.The 90-year-old Democratic senator was taken to a nearby hospital and returned home on Tuesday night, TMZ reported.Feinstein’s spokesperson told the San Francisco Chronicle that she spent an hour or two in the hospital. Her scans were clear, he added.Feinstein has struggled with her health in recent years. She was absent from the Senate for two-and-a-half-months due to shingles and other medical complications.The judge presiding over Donald Trump’s election subversion case, US district judge Tanya Chutkan, has set a date for a hearing on a proposed protective order by prosecutors.The protective order, if granted, will govern how evidence is handled in the case. The order, requested last Friday by special counsel Jack Smith’s team, asks for Trump to be prohibited from publicly sharing evidence in the case during the discovery phase.The decision to schedule the hearing for Friday morning comes a day after the special counsel’s office and Trump’s legal team filed dueling motions over the proposed protective order.Trump is not required to be present at the Friday hearing in Washington DC, Chutkan said.Donald Trump last week pleaded not guilty to charges that he conspired to overturn the results of the 2020 election by conspiring to block Congress from confirming Joe Biden’s victory over him. He also pleaded not guilty to charges that he obstructed the certification by directing his supporters to descend on the Capitol on the day of the January 6 attack.He is also accused of – and has pleaded not guilty to – scheming to disrupt the election process and deprive Americans of their right to have their votes counted.John Lauro slammed the indictment as politically motivated and full of holes. He said:
    This is what’s called a Swiss cheese indictment – so many holes that we’re going to be identifying.
    Lauro suggested that his side would argue that Trump’s actions were protected by his constitutional right to free speech as well as presidential immunity.Taking aim at Biden, the Democratic incumbent, Lauro added:
    This is the first time in history that a sitting president has used his justice department to go after a political opponent to knock him out of a race that creates grave constitutional problems.
    Lauro confirmed that he planned to file a motion to dismiss the conspiracy charges, as well as another to transfer the case from Washington DC’s federal courthouse to one in West Virginia, a state where Trump won 69% of the votes in 2020, his second largest margin of victory in a state after Wyoming.“We would like a diverse venue and diverse jury to have an expectation that will reflect the characteristics of the American people,” he said. “I think West Virginia would be an excellent venue.”Lauro was brought on to Trump’s legal team in mid-July. He has defended a string of controversial clients who include Dewayne Allen Levesque – manager of the Pink Pony nightclub in Florida who was acquitted of charges of racketeering, conspiracy, and aiding and abetting prostitution – and the disgraced NBA referee Tim Donaghy, who admitted to taking payoffs from bookies in exchange for a one-year, three-month prison sentence.Trump will not accept a plea deal in the criminal conspiracy charges, Lauro told CBS.Donald Trump’s attorney has suggested that Mike Pence could help his former boss fight off the 2020 election-related criminal conspiracy charges against Trump, claiming that the former vice-president would be the “best witness” for the defence.In an interview with CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday, attorney John Lauro played down differences between the former president and Pence’s accounts of what happened in the run up to the 6 January 2021 certification of Joe Biden’s victory over Trump, whose supporters attacked the US Capitol that day.Asked on Face the Nation whether he feared that Pence would be called as a prosecution witness in the case, Lauro said: “No, no in fact, the vice-president will be our best witness.
    There was a constitutional disagreement between the vice-president [Pence] and president Trump, but the bottom line is never, never in our country’s history, as those kinds of disagreements have been prosecuted criminally. It’s unheard of.
    Earlier on Sunday, Pence – who is running against Trump for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination – told CBS that he had “no plans” to testify for the prosecution. But he did not rule it out. In response to Lauro’s assertion last week that all Trump did was ask him to pause the certification, Pence said: “That’s not what happened.”The Fulton county district attorney’s office investigating Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the state of Georgia has been issuing summons to witnesses to testify before the grand jury, as part of the final presentation by prosecutors that is expected to take just a couple of days before they ask the grand jury to return an indictment, according to two people familiar with the matter.Charges stemming from the Trump investigation could come as early as next Tuesday if the presentment starts on Monday, the people said. That dovetails with a timeline inferred from district attorney Fani Willis instructing her staff to move to remote work during that period because of security concerns, the Guardian has previously reported.The district attorney’s office has spent more than two years investigating whether Trump and his allies interfered in the 2020 election in Georgia, including impaneling a special grand jury that made it more straightforward to compel evidence from recalcitrant witnesses.Unlike in the federal system, grand juries in the state of Georgia need to already be considering an indictment when they subpoena documents and testimony. By using a special grand jury, prosecutors can collect evidence without the pressure of having to file charges.The special grand jury in the Trump investigation heard evidence for roughly seven months and recommended indictments of more than a dozen people including the former president himself, its forewoman strongly suggested in interviews with multiple news outlets.Trump’s legal team sought last month to invalidate the work of the special grand jury and have Willis disqualified from proceedings, but the Georgia supreme court rejected the motion, ruling that Trump lacked “either the facts or the law necessary to mandate Ms Willis’s disqualification”.The Fulton county district attorney investigating Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the state of Georgia is expected to present evidence to a grand jury and ask it to return indictments as early as next Tuesday, according to two people familiar with the matter.The prosecutors in the office of district attorney Fani Willis completed its internal reviews for criminal charges in the Trump case weeks ago, the people said. The review process, to identify any weakness with the case, is typically seen as the final step before charges are filed.Willis has also privately indicated to her senior staff that the prosecutors on the Trump case were sufficiently prepared that they could go to trial tomorrow, the people said.In the Trump investigation, prosecutors have developed evidence to pursue a sprawling racketeering case that is predicated on a statute about influencing witnesses and computer trespass by Trump operatives in Coffee county, the Guardian has previously reported.The extent of Trump’s legal jeopardy remains unclear. But the racketeering statute in Georgia is especially expansive and attempts to solicit or coerce certain activity – for instance, Trump’s call to the secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger – could be included in the indictment.The district attorney’s office has also weighed several state election law charges, including: criminal solicitation to commit election fraud and conspiracy to commit election fraud, as well as solicitation of a public or political officer to fail to perform their duties and solicitation to destroy, deface or remove ballots.Willis originally suggested charging decisions were “imminent” in January, but the timetable has been repeatedly delayed after a number of Republicans who sought to help Trump stay in power as so-called fake electors accepted immunity deals as the investigation neared its end.The newly disclosed memo by Trump lawyer Kenneth Chesebro includes a strategy to explain why pro-Trump electors were meeting in states where Joe Biden was declared the winner, the Times reported.Chesebro wrote:
    I believe that what can be achieved on Jan. 6 is not simply to keep Biden below 270 electoral votes. It seems feasible that the vote count can be conducted so that at no point will Trump be behind in the electoral vote count unless and until Biden can obtain a favorable decision from the Supreme Court upholding the Electoral Count Act as constitutional, or otherwise recognizing the power of Congress (and not the president of the Senate) to count the votes.
    Good morning, US politics blog readers. A lawyer allied with former president Donald Trump initially pitched the now-infamous plan to use fake electors in swing states to subvert the 2020 election results as “a bold, controversial strategy” that the supreme court would “likely” reject, according to a secret memo.Federal prosecutors are portraying the memo, dated 6 December 2020 and written by Kenneth Chesebro, as a crucial link in how the Trump team’s efforts to keep him in power evolved into a criminal conspiracy, according to a New York Times report. The existence of the memo came to light in last week’s indictment of Trump.Chesebro, identified as “co-conspirator 5” in the federal indictment of Trump, reportedly argued that the plan would focus attention on claims of voter fraud and “buy the Trump campaign more time to win litigation that would deprive Biden of electoral votes and/or add to Trump’s column”. He wrote in the memo:
    I recognize that what I suggest is a bold, controversial strategy, and that there are many reasons why it might not end up being executed on Jan. 6. But as long as it is one possible option, to preserve it as a possibility it is important that the Trump-Pence electors cast their electoral votes on Dec. 14.
    The document, described by prosecutors as the “fraudulent elector memo”, provides new details about how the plan originated and was discussed behind the scenes. The memo show the plan was a criminal plot to engineer “a fake controversy that would derail the proper certification of Biden as president-elect”, prosecutors said.Here’s what else we’re watching today:
    3pm EST: President Joe Biden will speak about his administration’s clean energy and manufacturing investments in Albuquerque.
    5.55pm EST: Biden will fly to Salt Lake city.
    The House and Senate are out. More

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    Prosecutors seek to prevent Trump from sharing January 6 case evidence

    Federal prosecutors asked a federal judge to reject Donald Trump’s request for fewer restrictions over how he can publicly share evidence in the case involving his efforts to subvert the 2020 election, arguing the former president was seeking to abuse the discovery process.“The defendant seeks to use the discovery material to litigate this case in the media,” prosecutors wrote in an eight-page brief on Monday. “But that is contrary to the purpose of criminal discovery, which is to afford defendants the ability to prepare for and mount a defense in court.”The court filings, submitted to US district court judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing the case, highlighted comments made over the weekend by Trump lawyer John Lauro about former vice-president Mike Pence being a potential witness to stress the importance of strict restrictions.“This district’s rules prohibit defense counsel from doing precisely what he has stated he intends to do with discovery if permitted: publicize, outside of court, details of this case, including the testimony of anticipated witnesses,” prosecutors wrote.Trump has characterized the indictment, charging him with four felonies over his attempt to obstruct the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s election win on 6 January 2021 and overturn the results of the 2020 election, as a political witch-hunt and infringing on his first amendment rights.To that end, his lawyers filed a brief earlier on Monday asking the judge to issue a less restrictive protective order, a routine step in criminal cases to ensure evidence turned over to defendants in discovery is used to help construct a defense and not to chill witnesses.The 29-page document asked for various accommodations, such as giving Trump the ability to make public any transcripts of witness interviews that are not protected by grand jury secrecy rules, and to expand the circle of people who could gain access to the discovery material.But the prosecutors in the office of special counsel Jack Smith provided a line-by-line refutation of Trump’s requests, including that he be permitted to share evidence turned over to his legal team in discovery with people other than his own lawyers, such as volunteer attorneys.Allowing such broad language, prosecutors wrote, would render it boundless and allow Trump to share evidence, for instance, with any currently unindicted co-conspirators who are also attorneys and could benefit from otherwise confidential information.The procedural dispute between prosecutors and Trump’s legal team sets up an early test for Chutkan, who will now decide the matter. Chutkan ordered both sides to confer and jointly inform her by Tuesday 3pm of potential dates for a hearing to take place before 11 August.But a bitter fight this early in the process, over the protective order, which prosecutors say must be implemented before they start turning over evidence to Trump, suggests the case could be marked by contentious pre-trial motions from the former president with an eye on delay.As in the classified documents case, Trump’s overarching strategy in legal cases is to delay them. If a trial drags past the 2024 election and Trump were to win, he could try to pardon himself or direct his attorney general to drop the charges and jettison the case.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe current dispute started almost immediately after Trump was arraigned last week, when prosecutors took the routine step of asking for a protective order but specifically referenced a vaguely threatening post from Trump that read “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!”The prosecutors did not ask the judge to impose a gag order on Trump to prevent him from discussing the case, but made an inferential argument that there needed to be clear rules on how Trump could publicly use evidence turned over to him in discovery.Their main requests were to limit the people with access to the discovery materials to just people with an interest in the case, such as Trump’s lawyers, and to create a special category of “sensitive materials” that “must be maintained in the custody and control of defense counsel”.The sensitive materials would include things like “personally identifying information” of witnesses and information that emerged from the grand jury during the criminal investigation, which is kept secret under federal law.Under the proposed protective order, the government also allowed Trump’s lawyers to show him the sensitive materials. But he would not be permitted to keep copies or write down any personal information about the people in the materials, since that would circumvent the rule about copies.The Trump campaign responded hours later, saying in a statement that the post had not been directed at anyone involved in the case and suggesting that prosecutors were seeking to punish him for engaging in first amendment activity, or “the definition of political speech”. More

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    Trump claims protective order against him would infringe his free speech rights – live

    From 19m agoAhead of an afternoon deadline for his lawyers to respond to a request from special counsel Jack Smith for a protective order in the January 6 case, Donald Trump said such a ruling would infringe on his free speech rights.From his Truth social account:
    No, I shouldn’t have a protective order placed on me because it would impinge upon my right to FREE SPEECH. Deranged Jack Smith and the Department of Injustice should, however, because they are illegally “leaking” all over the place!
    The former president’s attorneys have until 5pm eastern time to respond to the request from Smith, who asked for the protective order after Trump on Friday wrote, “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!” on Truth.Smith wants Trump’s attorneys barred from publicly sharing “sensitive” materials including grand jury transcripts obtained during the January 6 case’s pre-trial motions.Aileen Cannon, the federal judge presiding over Donald Trump’s trial on charges related to keeping classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort, appeared to disclose an ongoing grand jury investigation in a court filing today, the Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports:Cannon was appointed to the bench by Trump, and faced scrutiny last year for a decision in an earlier stage of the Mar-a-Lago case that some legal experts viewed as favorable to the former president, and which was later overturned by an appeals court.Cannon’s is presiding over Trump’s trial in Florida on charges brought by special counsel Jack Smith, who alleges the former president illegally stored classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort, and conspired to hide them from government officials sent to retrieve them.In response to the charges filed against him over January 6, Donald Trump’s lawyers have argued the former president did not know that he indeed lost the 2020 election. But as the Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports, that defense may not be enough to stop prosecutors from winning a conviction:Included in the indictment last week against Donald Trump for his efforts to subvert the 2020 presidential election was a count of obstructing an official proceeding – the attempt to stop the vote certification in Congress on the day his supporters mounted the January 6 Capitol attack.The count is notable, because – based on a review of previous judicial rulings in other cases where the charge has been brought – it may be one where prosecutors will not need to prove Trump knew he lost the election, as the former president’s legal team has repeatedly claimed.The obstruction of an official proceeding statute has four parts, but in Trump’s case what is at issue is the final element: whether the defendant acted corruptly.The definition of “corruptly” is currently under review by the US court of appeals for the DC circuit in the case titled United States v Robertson. Yet previous rulings by district court judges and a different three-judge panel in the DC circuit in an earlier case suggest how it will apply to Trump.In short: even with the most conservative interpretation, prosecutors at trial may not need to show that Trump knew his lies about 2020 election fraud to be false, or that the ex-president knew he had lost to Joe Biden.“There’s no need to prove that Trump knew he lost the election to establish corrupt intent,” said Norman Eisen, special counsel to the House judiciary committee in the first Trump impeachment.“The benefit under the statute is the presidency itself – and Trump clearly knew that without his unlawful actions, Congress was going to certify Biden as the winner of the election. That’s all the corrupt intent you need,” Eisen said.Donald Trump’s team has clearly been paying attention to Ron DeSantis’s NBC News interview, with a spokeswoman attacking the Florida governor for his comments dismissing the ex-president’s false claims about his 2020 election loss:Speaking of Republican presidential candidates, NBC News scored a sit-down interview with Florida governor Ron DeSantis, and got him to again say that his chief rival Donald Trump lost the 2020 election.DeSantis, whose campaign for the White House is in troubled waters, had been vague on the issue until last week, when he started saying publicly that he did not believe the former president’s false claims about his election loss.Here he is saying it again, on NBC:In his final days as vice-president, Mike Pence faced pressure from Donald Trump to go along with his plan to disrupt Joe Biden’s election victory. Pence refused his then-boss’s request, and the two running mates are now foes, but could Pence potentially be a witness in the trial on the federal charges brought against Trump over the election subversion plot?In an interview with CBS News broadcast over the weekend, Pence, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination, said he has “no plans to testify”, but added “people can be confident we’ll obey the law. We’ll respond to the call of the law, if it comes and we’ll just tell the truth.”Far from being worried about what Trump’s former deputy might have to say about him, the former president’s attorney John Lauro said his legal team would welcome Pence’s testimony.“The vice-president will be our best witness,” Lauro said in a Sunday appearance on CBS, though he didn’t exactly say why he felt that way. “There was a constitutional disagreement between the vice-president [Pence] and president Trump, but the bottom line is never, never in our country’s history, as those kinds of disagreements have been prosecuted criminally. It’s unheard of.”Good morning, US politics blog readers. Mere days have passed since special counsel Jack Smith indicted Donald Trump for his failed effort to reverse his 2020 election loss, but the two sides are already battling over what the former president can say and do. On Friday, Trump wrote “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!”, prompting Smith’s prosecutors to request a protective order that would restrict what the former president’s legal team can share publicly, saying it is necessary to guard people involved in the case against retaliation.Trump’s lawyers have until 5pm eastern time today to respond. It’s an early salvo in what is expected to be the lengthy process Smith’s case is expected to take, and which will undoubtedly hang over the 2024 election, where Trump is currently the frontrunner. Either way, the former president has not been shy about sharing his thoughts regarding the unprecedented criminal charges leveled against him, and do not be surprised if today is no different.Here’s what else is happening:
    Voters in Ohio are gearing up to decide on Tuesday whether to approve a Republican-backed proposal that will raise the bar for changing the state’s constitution. What this is really about is a ballot initiative scheduled to be put to a vote in November that would enshrine abortion protections in the state’s laws, but which would face a much more difficult road to passage if tomorrow’s vote succeeds.
    Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor whose presidential campaign appears to be floundering, just sat down for an interview with NBC News, where, among other things, he reiterated that he believed Trump lost the 2020 election.
    Joe Biden is hosting World Series winners the Houston Astros at the White House today, before heading to the Grand Canyon. More

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    Pence has ‘no plans to testify’ against Trump but vows to ‘obey the law’

    Former vice-president and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Mike Pence said that he has “no plans to testify” against Donald Trump but vowed to “obey the law”.In a recent interview after federal prosecutors charged Trump over his efforts to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, Pence was asked by CBS correspondent Major Garrett whether he would be a witness against Trump if the case went to trial.Pence replied: “In this case, we’ve stood firmly for the rule of law. I took a stand, we challenged in court the scope of any testimony that I could provide, because as [the former] president of the Senate, the constitution provides me with the protections that are afforded to members of Congress. We won that at the lower court level and ultimately, we responded to a subpoena, and I have no plans to testify.“But people can be confident we’ll obey the law. We’ll respond to the call of the law, if it comes and we’ll just tell the truth.”Garrett went on to ask Pence whether he regards the latest indictment against Trump as political persecution, a claim that rightwing media outlets have been promoting in attempts to undermine the ex-president’s charges.Trump is accused of conspiracy to defraud the United States and one count of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding in connection with his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6 2021, the day that Congress met to certify his loss to Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential race.Pence said: “I’ve been very concerned about politicization at the justice department for years. I’ve been deeply troubled to see the double standard between the way that the justice department has gone after the president … and the way they seem to … take no interest in getting to the bottom of allegations of corruption around” Biden’s family.The Democratic incumbent president’s son Hunter Biden is facing tax- and gun-related charges filed by prosecutors.Nonetheless, Pence added he didn’t want to “prejudge” the indictment against Trump.“I don’t know whether the government has the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt to support this case,” Pence said during the interview, scheduled to air Sunday morning on CBS’s Face the Nation. “[Trump] is entitled to the presumption of innocence.”Pence vowed to “clean house” at the justice department, should he become the next president, saying that he will appoint “men and women at the highest levels … in this country that will restore the confidence of the American people in equal treatment under the law.”In response to whether he believed Trump can receive a fair trial in Washington DC’s federal courthouse, Pence replied that he has “every confidence” that the former president will make his case before a judge.“I’m never going to waver in making it clear to people that whatever the outcome of this indictment and – wherever it goes – I know I did my duty … to the constitution.”Earlier this week, Pence told Fox News that Trump and his “gaggle of crackpot lawyers” asked him to “literally reject votes” during the certification process.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAccording to the indictment, Trump pressured Pence repeatedly from late December to early January to reject electoral college votes, including on Christmas Day.At one point, Trump allegedly told the former vice-president, “You’re too honest,” a phrase that the Pence campaign has since capitalized on by selling “Too Honest” merchandise.Pence, in a separate interview Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union, said: “I’ve been called worse. … I’m more than happy to wear that label.”In a typically combative post on his Truth Social platform, Trump denied saying Pence was “too honest”.“He’s delusional,” said Trump’s post, which also dismissed Pence as “not a very good person”.Trump’s charges related to his 2020 defeat were contained in one of three indictments pending against him as of Sunday. He is also facing charges in New York state stemming from hush money payments to porn actor Stormy Daniels. And he is also facing a separate federal indictment pertaining to his allegedly illicit hoarding of government secrets at his Florida resort after he left the Oval Office.Trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges against him. He is widely seen as the frontrunner to clinch the Republican nomination for president, with the rest of the field – including Pence – trailing him substantially in the polls. More

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    Trump supporters condemn January 6 charges after third arraignment this year

    It’s the third time Donald Trump has been arraigned this year, even as he is the only former US president in history to face criminal charges. Each time, Trump and his supporters, as well as detractors, have moved to gain from his time in court.Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday in a Washington federal court to three counts of conspiracy and one count of obstruction in a plot to subvert the results of the 2020 election. He similarly denied his guilt in March over hush money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels, and then in June for illegally hoarding classified documents at his Florida resort.A handful of Republicans, though competing with Trump for the 2024 GOP nomination, fired off statements as the ex-president left the courthouse and returned to his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey.The biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy posted a video message filmed outside the federal courthouse calling the January 6 indictment “politicized persecution.” He earlier vowed to pardon Trump if elected.After Trump was indicted on Tuesday, the former vice-president Mike Pence – whom Trump allegedly called “too honest” after he refused to reject electoral votes according to the indictment – used the arraignment as fodder for his own campaign, including to sell merch. “[A]nyone who puts himself over the constitution should never be president of the United States,” Pence said in a statement.Trump has also moved to profit from each of his own indictments, blasting supporters with a barrage of fundraising requests after his court appearances in Miami and New York.Minutes after Trump left Washington, his son, Eric Trump, sent out a fundraising email with language calling the city “the belly of the beast”, according to NBC News. His campaign pulled in nearly $4m after his first arraignment in March and considerably less but still more than $1m after his arraignment in June, according to the New York Times.Trump earlier said being arrested was “a great honor” in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform. He also posted Thursday ahead of his arraignment: “I NEED ONE MORE INDICTMENT TO ENSURE MY ELECTION!”A district attorney, Fani Willis, is due to hand down a fourth indictment, related to election interference in Georgia, in the coming weeks.Conservative media outlets largely heaped praise on Trump while blasting the current probes against President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden. When asked by a CNN reporter if he would follow the indictment as he was cycling on vacation, the president said: “No.”Fox News host Jesse Watters downplayed Trump’s January 6 charges on air while applauding Trump for his “calm demeanor” during the arraignment, according to Mediaite. “By this January 6th indictment, we’re kind of tired of it,” Watters said on Thursday evening.Trump has seemingly grown more comfortable with each indictment, according to NBC News’ Garrett Haake, who has covered each indictment from the ground.While Trump appeared “tight and tense” on his March court date in Manhattan, he was joking with his attorneys in Washington, Haake told MSNBC Thursday evening. “He seemed so much more comfortable and practised at this.”For many, the federal charges against Trump for his role in inciting the violence at the US Capitol were the first steps to finally holding the ex-president accountable for the deadly attack over which 1,000 individuals have been charged. A US Capitol police officer, Sgt Aquilino Gonell, was in the courtroom where Trump appeared for his arraignment, along with two other officers who were overwhelmed by rioters.“On that day, I risked my life defending everyone regardless of their political affiliation,” wrote Gonell in a statement released after Trump left the courthouse. “Our democracy is worth fighting for. Not prosecuting is far riskier than having no consequences for the alleged power grab attempts. Justice and the rule of law must win for our democracy to survive.”Adam Schiff of California, a member of the House January 6 select committee, signed a letter along with dozens of other Democratic lawmakers urging the district court to publicly broadcast the trial proceedings. “It is imperative the conference ensures timely access to accurate and reliable information surrounding these cases and all of their proceedings, given the extraordinary national importance to our democratic institutions and the need for transparency,” the letter said.After the Tuesday indictment, Schiff said in a statement posted online the law “must” be enforced against a former US president and candidate for “the sake of our democracy”.Trump attorney John Lauro, who joined the legal team after special prosecutor Jack Smith informed the ex-president he was a target in the January 6 case, suggested moving the trial to West Virginia, which he called a more “diverse area” than DC in an interview with NPR ahead of the arraignment. Former federal prosecutors and legal experts said there was no basis for doing so.The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, who is the strongest contender for the Republican nomination after Trump, though trailing by a wide margin, said in a statement released after the Tuesday indictment that he would “end the weaponization of government, replace the FBI director, and ensure a single standard of justice for all Americans”.DeSantis did not, however, refer to Trump by name, and said he did not read the indictment. More

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    Donald Trump’s January 6 indictment – podcast

    “The attack on our nation’s Capitol on 6 January 2021 was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” special counsel Jack Smith said on Tuesday. “As described in the indictment, it was fuelled by lies.” Donald Trump has been charged over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The former president faces four counts: conspiracy to defraud the United States; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding; and conspiracy against rights. Trump, who is leading the polls in the Republican candidate race for the 2024 election, has been charged in three criminal indictments since leaving office. Hugo Lowell, a reporter at the Guardian’s Washington bureau, takes Michael Safi through the case outlined in the latest indictment and what it could mean for the upcoming election. More

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    Trump to hear obstruction and conspiracy charges for Jan 6 indictment in court – live

    From 6h agoGood morning. It is around 6am in Washington DC, where today we expect to see the 45th president of the United States, Donald Trump, in court.The former president is accused of conspiring to defraud the United States government, conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding, conspiring against rights, and obstruction and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding. Here is what we know and what we are expecting:
    Trump’s third appearance in a courtroom as a criminal defendant is expected at 4pm Eastern time (9pm BST).
    Prosecutors in Washington will outline the four conspiracy and obstruction counts and a judge will set bail conditions.
    The magistrate judge, Moxila Upadhyaya, will set a schedule for pre-trial motions and discovery.
    Both sides are likely later to file motions seeking to shape what evidence and legal arguments will be permitted at trial, which could be many months away.
    In a possible preview of Trump’s defence, his lawyer John Lauro called the indictment “an attack on free speech and political advocacy”, implying Trump’s lies about election fraud were protected under the constitutional right to freedom of expression.
    This is Martin Belam in London. I’ll be covering the build-up to Donald Trump’s court appearance for the next couple of hours before handing over to my colleagues in the US. You can reach me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.Republican representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has called the indictment against Donald Trump a “political assassination.”Greene, a staunch Trump ally, tweeted on Thursday:
    “Today’s indictment of President Trump is a political assassination attempt by Joe Biden and his henchmen to remove the leading presidential candidate from the ballot in 2024.”
    “The American people will reelect President Trump! #Trump2024,” she added.
    Mike Pence has hit back at the “gaggle of crackpot lawyers” that worked with Donald Trump to allegedly attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.The Guardian’s Adam Gabbatt reports:Trump was charged with four felonies this week over his attempts to meddle with the presidential election. The 45-page indictment shows that Pence was a crucial figure in Jack Smith, the special counsel, being able to bring those charges.“Contemporaneous notes” taken by Pence, and referred to in the indictment, document how Trump and his advisors pressured Pence to reject the certification of the election in January, which could have resulted in the House of Representatives handing Trump a second-term in office.On Wednesday, as Trump and his legal team attempted to downplay those efforts – one of Trump’s lawyers suggested that they only asked Pence to do “pause the voting” on January 6 – the usually meek Pence reacted angrily.“Let’s be clear on this point. It wasn’t just that they asked for a pause,” he told Fox News.“The president specifically asked me, and his gaggle of crackpot lawyers asked me, to literally reject votes, which would have resulted in the issue being turned over to the House of Representatives, and literally chaos would have ensued.”For the full story, click here:Donald Trump has vowed to get his revenge on Joe Biden and his attorney general for charging him “with as many crimes as can be concocted”.Posting on Truth Social, the former president wrote:
    Look, it’s not my fault that my political opponent in the Democrat Party, Crooked Joe Biden, has told his Attorney General to charge the leading (by far!) Republican Nominee & former President of the United States, me, with as many crimes as can be concocted so that he is forced to spend large amounts of time & money to defend himself. The Dems don’t want to run against me or they would not be doing this unprecedented weaponization of “Justice.” BUT SOON, IN 2024, IT WILL BE OUR TURN. MAGA!
    US Marshals have been seen inside the federal courthouse where Donald Trump is to due to appear later today.A group of heavily armed men, including members of the service’s special operations unit, were seen arriving inside the court with tactical gear and rifles, CNN reported. A bomb-sniffing dog, a black lab named Legend, was also seen on patrol, as well as Secret Service agents patrolling inside the building.From NBC’s Ryan J Reilly:Federal prosecutors have charged Donald Trump over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, the latest criminal case before the former president that comes just weeks after he was charged with retaining national defense information.You can read the indictment here in full:Biotech entrepeneur and GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy appeared outside the federal courthouse in Washington in an attempt to boost his visibility.In a video posted to Twitter, Ramaswamy questioned why Trump has been indicted in three “supposedly independent prosecutions” in the midst of a presidential election. “The government does not trust the people to select their leaders,” he said.When Donald Trump appears at the E. Barrett Prettyman Federal Courthouse in Washington, DC this afternoon to answer the indictment brought against him by special counsel Jack Smith for allegedly trying to overturn his 2020 election loss, he will not be formally arrested or have his mugshot taken.The former president will undergo digital fingerprinting as part of the booking process at the federal courthouse, and will be required to provide his social security number, date of birth, address, and other personal information, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday, citing US Marshals Service spokesman Drew Wade.Trump will not have his photograph taken during his processing, “since he’s already easily recognizable and there are already many photographs available”.He will also not be placed under arrest, according to Wade. In accepting the indictment on Tuesday, US Magistrate Judge Moxila Upadhyaya issued a summons for his appearance, not an arrest warrant.For those involved with the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol, special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment brought a collective sigh of relief, according to a Washington Post report.For them, the indictment served as the start of a final stage of accountability for Donald Trump and his allies that the committee long sought, but also as a validation of the group’s work, the paper wrote, citing sources.
    The indictment also elevated their findings outside of the political arena, where their work was subject to constant allegations of partisanship, bringing the credibility of the criminal justice system.
    Retired group chats were revived and calls placed to old colleagues as lawmakers and investigators absorbed the news.
    Tim Heaphy, the lead investigator for the committee, told the paper:
    As I read the indictment, it really struck me how closely it hews to our structure and our findings. Facts are what matters. And lawyers get too much credit for facts. We gathered really important facts because a lot of people came forward and gave us those facts. Those same facts are leading to a criminal indictment of the former president.
    The indictment comes more than two years after a group of Donald Trump’s supporters stormed the US Capitol in an attempt to disrupt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election. The January 6 attack, which has already resulted in more than 1,000 arrests, caused the deaths of seven people, a bipartisan Senate report found.Despite the deadly consequences of the Capitol insurrection, past efforts to hold Trump accountable for the violence and his broader election subversion campaign have fallen short. The House voted to impeach Trump for inciting the insurrection, but he was acquitted by the Senate. The House then passed a bill calling for the formation of an independent commission to investigate the Capitol attack, but that proposal also failed in the Senate.House Democrats instead created a select committee to examine the origins and impact of the January 6 insurrection, and the panel held a series of hearings that painted a damning picture of a president hellbent on remaining in office even after it became clear he had fairly lost his bid for reelection. The select committee ultimately voted to refer Trump to the justice department for criminal prosecution, but the panel itself could not advance charges against the former president.Kristy Parker, a former federal prosecutor and now counsel at the nonpartisan nonprofit Protect Democracy, said:
    The select committee did an outstanding job of presenting a lot of evidence that they gleaned from their interviews with people who essentially were willing to cooperate, but criminal investigators and prosecutors have the ability to subpoena people.
    Unlike Donald Trump’s first two indictments, the former president’s third set of criminal charges stands out as the first major legal effort to hold him accountable for attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election.Pro-democracy experts welcomed the indictment as a victory for the rule of law that could help fortify America’s election systems in the face of ongoing threats from Trump and his allies.The indictment charges Trump with four counts: conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights in his relentless pursuit to reverse the outcome of the 2020 election and remain in office.“This is one of the worst things any American president has ever done,” said Michael Waldman, president and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s School of Law.
    The magnitude of the indictment matches the magnitude of what Trump tried to do, which is to overthrow the constitutional system to stay in office.
    The significance of the indictments extends beyond accountability, Parker argued. As Trump and his allies continue to spread lies about rampant voter fraud and threaten the foundation of America’s system of government, the recently announced criminal charges could send a chilling message to anyone else considering similar anti-democratic efforts in the future.“We have been kind of living under a question mark ever since the events of January 6, and that question mark has been: are we as a country going to be able to hold this person accountable, even though he was the 45th president of the United States?” Kristy Parker, a former federal prosecutor and now counsel at the nonpartisan nonprofit Protect Democracy, said.
    If you let a person like that walk away without any kind of accountability, then the chances of something like what we saw on January 6 happening again are extremely high.
    Here are some key takeaways from the latest indictment:Trump faces four chargesThe former president is accused of conspiring to defraud the United States government, conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding, conspiring against rights, and obstruction and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding.In the 45-page indictment, prosecutors laid out their case in stark detail, alleging Trump knowingly spread false allegations about fraud, convened false slates of electors and attempted to block the certification of the election on January 6.The former president was ‘determined to remain in power’Federal prosecutors said Trump was “determined to remain in power”. Prosecutors said that for two months after his election loss, Trump spread lies to create an “intense national atmosphere of mistrust and anger” and “erode public faith in the administration of the election”. They cited an example in Georgia, where Trump claimed more than 10,000 dead people voted in four days even after the state’s top elections official told him that was not true.There are six un-indicted co-conspiratorsThe indictment included six un-indicted co-conspirators as part of Smith’s inquiry, including four unnamed attorneys who allegedly aided Trump in his effort to subvert the 2020 election results, as well as an unnamed justice department official and an unnamed political consultant.While unnamed in the document, the details in the indictment indicate that those people include Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, John Eastman, Ken Chesebro as well as the former US justice department official Jeff Clark.The special counsel wants a speedy trialIt’s unclear yet when the case will go to trial, but special counsel Jack Smith said his office will seek speedy proceedings. Smith said in a press conference on Tuesday:
    I must emphasize that the indictment is only an allegation and that the defendant must be presumed innocent until proven guilty, beyond a reasonable doubt, in a court of law.
    Indictments won’t disqualify Trump from officeTrump’s indictments will not bar him from seeking the presidency again, nor will any conviction. However, if he’s convicted, there would likely be lawsuits seeking to disqualify him from the ballot under the 14th amendment, which bars those who have engaged in “insurrection or rebellion” from holding office. But Congress could override that disqualification in the 14th amendment by two-thirds vote.The indictment follows a path laid by the House January 6 committeeThe congressional panel, which was created to investigate the insurrection, concluded last December recommending criminal charges. Over the course of the investigation, the committee conducted more than 1,000 interviews, collected more than a million documents and interviewed key witnesses. In public hearings, some held at prime time, investigators aired dramatic and damning footage, making the case that Trump “was directly responsible for summoning what became a violent mob” despite understanding that he had lost the election.The justice department received what the committee had uncovered, but conducted its own interviews and used its authority to gain key evidence that wasn’t easily accessible to Congress.The final charges against Trump include ones that the committee had recommended, including conspiracy to defraud the United States.Members of the media and public are lining up outside the federal courthouse in Washington, where Donald Trump is expected to appear at 4pm Eastern time (9pm BST).The chief of the Capitol Police told reporters on Wednesday that the force is “prepared for whatever might happen”. He said there is “security plan in place” but declined to go into specifics.Donald Trump’s former attorney general William Bar said he believes Trump “knew well he lost the election” and that special counsel Jack Smith has more evidence to prove that the former president knew the 2020 election was not stolen.Barr, who resigned as Trump’s attorney general weeks after the election in December 2020, told CNN:
    At first I wasn’t sure, but I have come to believe he knew well he had lost the election.
    He went on to say that the four charges Trump is accused of in the latest indictment are just the “tip of the iceberg” and that Smith has “a lot more evidence” against him.
    I think there is a lot more to come, and I think they have a lot more evidence as to President Trump’s state of mind.
    “It would not come out very well for him” if Trump took the stand on that defense, Barr said, adding that he doubted if the former president “remembers all the different versions of events he has given over the last few years.”Good morning from Washington DC. Thursday’s arraignment follows the release of a 45-page indictment that alleges that Donald Trump repeated false claims of election fraud, despite repeated warnings from multiple people in his circle, including senior leaders in the Department of Justice and senior attorneys who had been appointed by Trump, and the former vice-president Mike Pence, who told him “he had seen no evidence of outcome-determinative fraud”.The indictment describes a conspiracy which, at its core, involves Trump and his co-conspirators allegedly trying to dupe Pence into falsely suggesting the outcome of the 2020 election had been in doubt.To do so, prosecutors say Trump tried to use the Department of Justice to open “sham election fraud investigations” and repeatedly tried to co-opt Pence into rejecting electoral college votes for Joe Biden in an effort to stop his election win being certified.When that failed, the indictment says, Trump tried to block the certification and exploited the January 6 Capitol attack by trying to push false claims of election fraud and to convince members of Congress to continue to delay the certification.The indictment also listed six co-conspirators who were not charged in the indictment. While they were unnamed, the descriptions of five of the six matched those of the Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, John Eastman, Ken Chesebro as well as the former US justice department official Jeff Clark.This is Léonie Chao-Fong taking over the blog in Washington. You can reach me at leonie.chao-fong@theguardian.comMy colleague in New York, Sam Levine, has put together this useful guide to some of the possible scenarios and outcomes from this criminal legal action against Donald Trump. He addresses some of the key unknowns, like for example “If convicted, can Trump be blocked from holding office?”, “What happens if Trump goes on trial during the presidential primaries?” and “could Trump theoretically pardon himself if he goes on to win the Republican nomination and then the election?”Donald Trump has used his Truth Social platform to issue an early morning screed to call for a change of venue in the trial.Labelling it a “fake ‘case’” which has been “brought by crooked Joe Biden and deranged Jack Smith”, Trump suggested “politically unbiased” West Virginia as a venue, arguing it is impossible for him to get a fair trial in Washington, which he described as “95% anti-Trump”.The message suggests that anybody who thought Trump might temper his language, in light of the charges he faces, was misguided.In the Washington Post this morning, one lawyer is quoted suggesting that the case could hinge on whether the prosecution can prove what is going on inside Donald Trump’s mind. It quotes Robert Kelner, who it describes as a veteran DC lawyer, saying:
    I think the entire indictment really turns on the question of Trump’s intent. Arguably, there isn’t any smoking-gun evidence in the indictment regarding intent, though there is certainly circumstantial evidence. At the heart of the case is really a metaphysical question of whether it’s even possible for Donald Trump to believe that he lost the election, or lost anything else, for that matter.
    [Special Counsel Jack] Smith needs to show that all of the false statements Trump made about the election, which the indictment chronicles in great detail, were understood by Trump to be false; otherwise, it becomes a case about political speech and first amendment rights.
    There is a decades-old question about whether, in the privacy of his own office or bedroom, Donald Trump admits to things that he doesn’t admit publicly or whether, even when he’s staring at himself in the bathroom mirror shaving, he’s telling himself the same lies that he tells the rest of us. I don’t think we know the answer. It may be an unanswerable question.
    In his response to the indictment on Tuesday, Donald Trump’s statement described it as a “pathetic attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their weaponized Department of Justice to interfere with the 2024 Presidential Election”.“Biden Crime Family” has become the latest epithet that Donald Trump drops into his statements in the hope that it will be picked up and amplified by his followers.The former president has a knack for pithy phrases and nicknames which become shortcuts and memes for his fans – think rallies chanting “Lock her up” about opponent “Crooked Hillary” Clinton in the 2016 election or Trump dubbing his opponent “sleepy Joe” in 2020.It isn’t just those in the Democratic party who have been on the receiving end. He has labelled his Florida governor opponent for the 2024 nomination “Ron DeSanctimonious” and Ted Cruz earned the Trump name “Lyin’ Ted”.“Biden Crime Family” isn’t an original Trump phrase though, but one that has been floating around Republican circles for some time. In fact only a week ago Jill Biden’s first husband was using the phrase in a New York Post interview about his experience of dealing with the president and his wife after the split.The “crime family” name derives from a continued Republican fascination with the legal worries of Biden’s son Hunter, who has pleaded not guilty to tax and gun charges. Overseas dealings involving the Biden family have been subject to a House Oversight Committee investigation, which is yet to report any wrongdoing. More